Author: johnnyryan

Writer & thinker. Chief Policy & Industry Relations Officer at Brave. Author of 'A History of the Internet and the Digital Future' http://amzn.com/1861897774 .

Designing services for smarter business

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I wrote this article on service design for The Irish Times, published on 5 September 2014. Article is at http://www.irishtimes.com/business/designing-services-for-smarter-business-1.1916748 The Apple user or Nespresso drinker appreciates not only the physical good, but the entire experience of interacting with the business A customer’s relationship with a service is often unpleasant and short. But occasionally something … Continue reading Designing services for smarter business

Design Thinking, and thinking like a child, for product design

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This is a slightly shortened piece I wrote for The Irish Times on Design Thinking in organisations. Full article is here http://www.irishtimes.com/business/bring-design-thinking-to-your-product-1.1822064 Bring design thinking to your product Thinking like a child could save your business cash US technology investor Dave McClure coined a maxim that sums this challenge up: “Your solution is not my problem.” … Continue reading Design Thinking, and thinking like a child, for product design

Press: “Innovation Academy UCD appoints Dr. Johnny Ryan as Executive Director”

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Dublin, 8 April 2014:  The Innovation Academy, UCD, today announced that it has appointed Dr Johnny Ryan as Executive Director.  In his new role Dr. Ryan will take responsibility for the execution of the strategic mission and expansion of the Academy, and management of core operations including staff, programmes, and commercial operations. Dr. Ryan joins the … Continue reading Press: “Innovation Academy UCD appoints Dr. Johnny Ryan as Executive Director”

New project: Prevent national health crises by mining public discussion and news to predict vaccination uptake

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Prevent national health crises by mining public discussion and news to predict vaccination uptake This is the proposal that I submitted yesterday to the Knight Foundation health data challenge. See the proposal, and vote on it if you like it, at the Knight News Challenge. Vaccines matter. We want to predict uptake by mining news … Continue reading New project: Prevent national health crises by mining public discussion and news to predict vaccination uptake

A look back at ReformCard: the political reform score card

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ReformCard is a measurement tool to rank each political party based on the quality of their policies on political reform to inform the election 2011 debate. It provides the 25 proposals for political reform in Ireland which we believe provide the best possible combination to transform the political system and ensure it is fit for purpose in the 21st century.The starting point is that Ireland’s economic crisis exposed the malfunctioning of the political system. We need to change how politics works to ensure this never happens again.

Interview with internet pioneer Steve Crocker

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In a bathroom, at three in the morning in April 1969, a graduate student named Steve Crocker started to write one of the most important documents of the last century. Though drafted in humble circumstances Crocker’s document would set the open, inclusive tone of the next half century of Internet engineering culture, and initiate the process of defining the rules that govern virtually all data exchange on the planet.

Advertising’s historic pivot point

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This is a piece I originally published in Contagious.An understandable malaise in ad agencies surrounds all things digital. Low revenues on the one hand and a new answerability to metrics on the other are accompanied by a sense that digital formats remain largely underdeveloped, and that new, possibly unwelcome, surprises await. This is a moment … Continue reading Advertising’s historic pivot point

Links are sacred (links, newspapers, and copyright)

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This is my op ed in The Irish Times, 7 January 2013. In the early 1960s a Harvard graduate student named Ted Nelson developed the idea of ‘hypertext’, a system of digitised links between tidbits of information that would transcend the limitations of printed paper. The idea was wildly ambitious. A user could click various … Continue reading Links are sacred (links, newspapers, and copyright)

The 2012 tech topic, and a guess at the topic of 2013…

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A brief note: I was asked to think about the hot topic in tech for 2012, and make a prediction for the hot topic of 2013 by Corriere della sera, an Italian newspaper. It might seem passé, but I think the hot topic of 2012 has been mobile Internet.  The ITU disclosed in June 2012 that mobile‐broadband … Continue reading The 2012 tech topic, and a guess at the topic of 2013…

An experiment in startups working with news media companies: looking back at The Irish Times Digital Challenge

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(This post also appeared in The Irish Times on 4 October 2012.) LAST FRIDAY, at The Workman’s Club on Wellington Quay in Dublin, an Irish technology start-up company called GetBulb was announced as the overall winner of The Irish Times Digital Challenge. GetBulb has produced a system that can rapidly create data visualisations suitable for … Continue reading An experiment in startups working with news media companies: looking back at The Irish Times Digital Challenge

Piece on 3D printing in The Irish Times

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The Irish Times, 24 September 2012: "3D printers to manufacture a revolution". (This is a condensed version of a longer piece - read full piece here) THE THREE trends toward cheaper 3D printing, consumer co-creation, and digital distribution should be understood as part of a great adjustment. The current stage of 3D printing is analogous to the … Continue reading Piece on 3D printing in The Irish Times

Week One: The Irish Times Digital Challenge

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http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_A_zI4oMWwM I PREVIOUSLY POSTED THIS ON THE HUFFINGTON POST. RE POSTED HERE. Some months ago I set up The Irish Times Digital Challenge to invite digital entrepreneurs to propose ways to work with The Irish Times. Almost 81 early stage digital companies applied, of which 14 were invited to pitch in person. From this a … Continue reading Week One: The Irish Times Digital Challenge

The Internet makes trust and insight scarce commodities, and makes newsroom veterans more valuable

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Recently I have been looking at the newspaper as a service and as a business (for reasons that will become apparent later). Something is becoming clear. While the Internet makes information plentiful, and this in turn may be a challenge to some aspects of the newspaper business, deep insight and trust remain as scarce as … Continue reading The Internet makes trust and insight scarce commodities, and makes newsroom veterans more valuable

“Peer-to-Peer Retail”: Social marketing/commerce is not just about ‘likes’

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Owjo, the social commerce startup where I worked as evangelist/marketer/product guy, had a big problem. Its offering was so big, and so potentially transformative, that prospective customers couldn't get a quick grasp of it. Part of my job was to break the product down, so that discrete offerings could be orientated to specific markets. The … Continue reading “Peer-to-Peer Retail”: Social marketing/commerce is not just about ‘likes’

3D printing – Johnny Ryan talks with Vyomesh Joshi, EVP of HP’s printing business

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HP are interesting because they are the first major manufacturer to enter the 3D printing space, partnering last year with Stratasys to offer 3D printers directly to designers and architects at the sub $20,000 range. So I questioned Vyomesh Joshi, Executive Vice President of HP's Imaging and Printing Group, about where HP is going. Johnny … Continue reading 3D printing – Johnny Ryan talks with Vyomesh Joshi, EVP of HP’s printing business

Principles, Norms, and Constraints: building a new national approach to digital issues

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Discussion document for the new IIEA National Digital Principles Group: We are present at a unique moment in time when the shape and character of the emerging digital area is becoming clear. To grasp the opportunity, consider as historical precedents the decades following Gutenberg’s Press, or early decades of the Industrial Age. Strategic and inventive … Continue reading Principles, Norms, and Constraints: building a new national approach to digital issues

Piece in Wired: “Dublin Web Summit highlights the under-reported successes of Irish tech”

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Following on from my previous piece in Wired UK on the optimism at the Pub Summit, this piece takes a macro snapshot of the Dublin startup scene during last week's Web Summit. See  Web Summit story on Wired UK here, or read on below.. Last Friday was a big tech day for Dublin. Web game … Continue reading Piece in Wired: “Dublin Web Summit highlights the under-reported successes of Irish tech”

Frederick Taylor, DEC, and Zynga: how does “idea fuel” filter to the top of perpetual beta organisations?

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I broke bread with the speakers after the Dublin Web Summit on Friday (see my coverage of the Summit for Wired UK), and sat opposite Marcus Segal, Zynga's Chief Operating Officer for Games. Segal is faced with a hell of a problem: Zynga is growing like a super nova, and the model it uses relies … Continue reading Frederick Taylor, DEC, and Zynga: how does “idea fuel” filter to the top of perpetual beta organisations?

The “Android Paradox” – Google’s bright future at both ends of the market

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Update 9 June 2011: What a mess. My original "Google's bright future at both ends of the market" appeared in Business & Economy as "Android apps will be of low quality". This is absolutely not what my line of reasoning was in the piece. I have asked B&E to change the title to something more … Continue reading The “Android Paradox” – Google’s bright future at both ends of the market

My piece in Wired UK – “Optimism in Dublin’s start-up scene: Pub Summit 2011 report”

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My piece for Wired UK on the start up scene in Ireland, and the Pub Summit last night, is copied below. See article on Wired. Text of the article below: Despite the rain, and economic collapse, Dublin seems to be the place to be at the moment. A long line of entrepreneurs and investors queued … Continue reading My piece in Wired UK – “Optimism in Dublin’s start-up scene: Pub Summit 2011 report”

Mobile OS Wars – the new rules of the mobile ecology

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I wrote a piece for India's Business & Economy on the mobile OS war. Draft text below... (online version article available here) The eco system is key. The mobile OS giants have one guiding principle: the OS with the best selection of software applications available for its users will be most attractive to consumers, and … Continue reading Mobile OS Wars – the new rules of the mobile ecology

Plastic information, niche audiences, extruded media, and network governance

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De Filosoof (The Philosopher), a journal edited by graduate students and faculty at the University of Utrecht, asked me to respond to some searching questions. Three are copied below [note: this is unedited draft text]... From the very beginning Internet has challenged social, intellectual and political hierarchies. RFC 3, released in April 1969, ‘established the … Continue reading Plastic information, niche audiences, extruded media, and network governance

Q&A about the history of the Internet with the Epoch Times

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The Epoch Times published a Q&A here with me about the book. We covered the idea behind the book and politics. Text below... The Internet has integrated itself into nearly every aspect of modern life, following users on the cell phone, at work, and at home. While the Web grows, however, its history and future … Continue reading Q&A about the history of the Internet with the Epoch Times